Stern on XM/Sirius Merger: 'I Will Never Vote For a Democrat Again'

Stern described a phone conversation he had with his agent, who he described as a “liberal Democrat kind of guy.”

“I go, ‘That’s it!’” Stern said. “[I] go, ‘You know what Don, I’ve voted Republican and I’ve voted Democrat. I have vowed I will never vote for a Democrat again. I don’t give a [expletive] – no matter who they are. I don’t care if God becomes a Democrat.’ I said, ‘I backed Hillary Clinton, I backed Al Gore, I backed John Kerry. I am done with them.’”

Stern took it a step even further and called Democrats on the FCC “communists” and referred to their tactics as “gangsterism.”

“The fact that these Democrats on the FCC are communists,” Stern said. “They’re for communism. They don’t want to see companies – this is gangsterism. I said, ‘This is crazy.’

That is interesting. I wondered what on-air personalities such as himself felt about this merger. They are really the only ones who may "suffer" by the companies merging. Less negotiating power on their end.

He has about 2 1/2 years left on his contract. He says he might retire... I personally doubt that he will. If he did, it would probably be a soft retirement where he still came up with the programming for his channels and did at least a couple of days per week live.

He's probably not concerned because he has a boatload of stock that should go up nicely in value and he will just want to crush terrestrial radio. Opening up the XM spectrum to him is going to be a huge boost to his long term ratings. At this point his ego will drive him. More money is just a way to keep score for him at this point.

And he's not going to retire. I say another 3 year contract with more stock and less hours to make up for less money.

Howard had Mel Karmazin on his show a few weeks ago talking about all this. I personally believe that he will not retire right away, because he knows alot of people came to sirius just to hear his show uncensored. He wouldn't turn his back on the company that freed him from the FCC nonsense. Alot of people say he is an ass and all this stuff but nobody seems to remember that on the morning of 9/11, he was one of the main ways many people found out about the planes hitting the towers, as his show was syndicated, and was actually the first one on the air to say he thought it was Bin Laden who was behind it.

This company has grown in a large part because of him, but not only that but alot of people are tired of channel surfing when their station fades out from distance, and tired of commercials and censorship. I got a Sirius radio in 2003, before there was even talk of Howard coming, and it was great than, and has only gotten better, and it will only contiue to get better, but you will start to see wars within the Sirius XM network, as you will have Howard, Oprah and Opie and Anthony on the same network at the same times in the morning, so that will make it even better!